(Tim Farrell/The Star-Ledger)Steve Lonegan: If he were the governor he'd take the guns away from the animal-rights nuts and give them to private citizens.

Check the clip from Fox News above. First the commentator brings up the dreadful Snooki. Then he starts talking about the decision last week by the Christie crowd to take part in a press conference telling you to put your schnauzer in a seat belt.

Pretty funny, right?

Not if you're a conservative who actually cares about this state.

At one point the anchor makes a crack about Christie. I can't quite make out what he says. Perhaps you can.

In any event, Christie had better learn the meaning of that old saying "The buck stops here."

Every time someone in his administration gets caught doing something silly like this, he hides behind a standard line about how there are thousands of people sending out letters on his letterhead.

Guess what, Guv?

If it had been Steve Lonegan's name on that letterhead, you wouldn't see this sort of nonsense.

The conservative who lost the 2009 GOP gubernatorial primary would never in a million years let his motor vehicle commissioner appear at a press conference with an armed animal-rights fanatic like "Colonel" Frank Rizzo of the SPCA.

That colonel would quickly become a private - a private citizen, that is.
Lonegan would take the guns away from these dangerous animal activists. And he'd make sure that private citizens were permitted to purchase guns as required by law - a law ignored by the Christie administration.
This is not a minor point. As a former U.S. Attorney, Christie shows an over-reliance on the power of the government over the individual citizen. I suspect he is not bothered at all by having the pet police running around imposing their will on innocent dog owners driving around with their pets.
I don't know for sure. But when I put that question to his spokesman Mike Drewniak in an e-mail on Wednesday, I never heard back.

So we have to assume the Guv endorses the idea that it's illegal for New Jerseyans to drive around with their pets poking their noses out the window.

And it's not just Fox News turning this into a Jersey joke. Even the national Republican Party website is making fun of the Christie administration's nanny-state tactics.

And then there's Comedy Central weighing in with this witticism at Christie's expense:

Okay, yes, the fine is actually directed at the driver, but the idea that this is a measure to combat "distracted driving" is undercut by the paucity — paw-city! — of incidents in which an unsecured pet was the cause of an accident. It's mostly a revenue-raising measure. Or perhaps a subtle signal on part of Christie about the lengths he'll go to to secure Mitt Romney's favor. After all, how can we now blame Romney for strapping up that dog — in New Jersey, it's the law.

In other states they say "Curb your dog."

Here in Jersey someone has to tell the governor: "Curb your dog police."

I think I speak for every sane person in New Jersey when I ask the following question:

How can you let these gun-toting animal-rights activists threaten innocent citizens and make a joke of New Jersey?

I'll let you know if I ever get an answer.

In the meantime, here are the questions I sent on Wednesday to Christie's p.r. people. As i said, I'm still awaiting a response:

1. Does the governor have a position on whether gun-toting “colonels” in the SPCA should be threatening to stop people for transporting dogs in their cars without buckling them in?

2. Just how the hell does the state let people in private organizations adopt titles like “colonel” and threaten the citizenry?
3. Would this guy bring back the death penalty for what Mitt Romney did?
4. Why is an official of the Christie administration participating in this?